


Don't Listen

by Beth Harker (Beth_Harker)



Category: Newsies (1992)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, implied racism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2019-09-30 06:37:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17218838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beth_Harker/pseuds/Beth%20Harker
Summary: Mush loses a fight, and Blink helps him get fixed up after.





	Don't Listen

Blink barged into the lodging house three hours later than usual, shoulders slumped and hat in his hands. He slammed his lodging fee, flat-palmed onto the desk, and leaned in close to Kloppman.

“You seen him?” Blink asked, scanning the log book, trying to find the the blocky, painstakingly legible capital letters that made up his best friend’s signature. Race was listed, along with Swifty, Skittery, Jack, and Bumlets. There was an incoherent scribble that everyone knew belonged to Dutchy, followed by somebody calling themselves Hubert the Humble Ham Eater, who could only be Specs. Blink clenched his jaw, then flipped forward in the book, but the page is empty. “He here or what?”

“Who? You talking about Mush?” The old man asked.

“ ‘Course I’m talking about Mush! Who else’d I be talking about? He—”

“Told me you was going to pay his lodging for the night.”

That gave Blink pause. His mouth opened, and closed, then he fished into his pocket for some extra coins. Kloppman waved them off, and gestured towards the staircase.

“Came in pretty beat up, he did. Were’t so long ago. Don’t think there’s any great danger, but he didn’t want to stay and talk about it. You just gonna stand here all night?”

Blink didn’t need to be told anything else. He tossed Mush’s lodging fee down on the desk before Kloppman could refuse it again, and bolted up the stairs.

———–

“Mush here?”

Skittery, who was showing Tumbler some kind of game with a pen and paper, gestured towards the bathroom where the showers were. Racetrack was heading up a round of marbles in one corner of the room, and Bumlets was sitting on his bed making a valiant attempt to sew the sole back onto one of his shoes. Nobody else paid Blink any mind, which meant that Mush wasn’t dead or gushing blood, but also that he’d probably let the other boys know to mind their own business in one way or another.

The door to the bathrooms was just about never closed, but Blink went in and shut it softly behind him. He bent down to see if he could see Mush’s feet in the gap at any of the stalls. “Hey,” he called out. “Hey Mush, it’s me.”

“Hi Kid,” Mush called back. He was in the fifth stall, and he sounded okay. “Just getting dressed.”

Blink nodded, even though Mush couldn’t see him. The room was quiet, except for the soft shuffle of clothing, and a steady drip from one of the shower heads. Mush was damp and dressed in his night clothes when he came out. His lip was busted, and he had the beginnings of a shiner. He looked just like anybody who had ever gotten into a fight.

“You get any good hits in?” Blinked asked.

“Knocked a guy’s front teeth out,” Mush answered. “All of mine is still here. Think it’s owing to how I brush 'em every morning. I’ve got good, strong teeth, Kid.”

Mush turned away from him to hang his towel up on the wall, then he just stood there swinging his arms as if he didn’t know what to do next. Mush was as good a fighter as any guy, better than most, but he’d never learned to enjoy it. He’d talked to Blink once or twice about wishing he could be a pacifist like David, but they both knew that kind of fancy philosophy had no place on the streets.

“Want me to look you over?”

“Yeah,” there was a palpable tinge of relief in Mush’s voice, and he turned to wrap his arms around Blink for just a second before going to sit down on the sink. Mush would never guess, probably, how much the easy trust in gestures such as that brief hug won Blink over again and again.

Mush was still and quiet as Blink took his face in his hands, only wincing slighting when Blink ran a finger over the bloody spot on his lip. They’d been in this place before, hundreds of times, only Blink was usually the one who’d gotten knocked around, and needed Mush to check him out. It wasn’t that serious. It was just good to have someone else tell you that you weren’t broken, nice to be touched by someone you liked. At least that was how it seemed most of the time. The role reversal of seeing Mush hurt for once made the back of Blink’s mouth taste sour.

“Your nose ain’t broke,” Blink announced. “And you still got all your teeth, just like you said.”

“Have a look at my back.” Mush shrugged out of his shirt, turning so Blink could see. It was bruised up a lot worse than Blink had expected, along with Mush’s arms and stomach. When Blink placed his hands on his back, a shudder went up through Mush, like an echo of all that nervous energy from when he’d been swinging his arms earlier.

“Was there a lot of 'em?” Blink asked.

“Eight, I guess.”

“Eight dead men. Just you wait and see.”

“They said Bottle Alley’s their turf now,” Mush explained. “It ain’t, but you get enough kids together any turf can be yours.”

“Bet you I can find twenty kids who’ll say they don’t get any turf in this city at all.”

Mush almost smiled at that. “Bet I know who those twenty kids is. I’ll be there too.”

Mush went quiet, but he didn’t go back to the bunk room where the others were, so Blink didn’t go either. Mush was the kind of guy who could talk forever about nothing, but needed time to gather his thoughts when things got serious.

“Hey Kid?”

“Yeah, Mush?”

“You think my either of my folks was bad people, to get me here? I guess I always imagined them as real nice, but…”

Blink sat down on the sink next to Mush, and put his arm around his shoulder. “Was those kids ragging on your folks? How many of them you think know their own folks, huh?”

“It weren’t about being an orphan, Kid.”

There was a bluntness to Mush at that moment that didn’t normally exist, a sort of resignation and understanding that was worse than any bruise. Blink pulled him in tighter.

“Don’t listen to them,” Blink advised. “Don’t you ever, you got that? I don’t know nothin’ about your folks, but you’re worth twenty times as much as any of those guys who went after you.”

A pause. “Alright Kid.” Mush got down off the shelf. He put his shirt back on. Mush didn’t usually wear shirts to bed. He said that they were hot and itchy, every last one of them.

“Don’t you believe me?” Asked Blink.

Mush wouldn’t meet his eyes, and if that wasn’t the worst thing Blink had ever seen, he didn’t know what was. “Today wasn’t a good day,” Mush explained. Coming from Mush, that was like admitting the sky had fallen. There was a sinking feeling in the pit if Blink’s stomach, that he didn’t think would go away until he’d fixed it. He needed Mush, after all. He needed him to be himself, with his openness, his kindness, and his optimism intact.

“Then let’s make it a good day. We’ll go get something to eat, then go somewhere else for some fun. Come on.”

Blink reached for Mush’s hand, thankful and relieved when Mush’s warm fingers intertwined with his.


End file.
